Multiroom Audio (Lyrion Music Server)¶

Last Updated: 2026-08-02 Status: ⚠️ Music playback working — Audiobookshelf to kitchen speakers not yet implemented

Purpose¶

Whole-home audio across the kitchen and living room, playing the music library hosted on Lotus. The kitchen runs a wired I2S DAC/amp; the living room is reached over Chromecast because the Sony HT-A9 has no free wired input.

Lyrion Music Server (LMS, formerly Logitech Media Server) is the server and sync engine. It replaced an earlier Music Assistant + Snapcast attempt that was not reliable enough.

Location¶


Hosted on	Lotus (primary NAS)
Container name	Lyrion Music Server
Local URL	http://192.168.1.83:9000
External URL	None

Architecture¶

Lotus — Lyrion Music Server (Docker, br0, 192.168.1.83)
├── Plex plugin → music library at data/media/music
├── Squeezelite client → Kitchen Pi → HiFiBerry MiniAMP → speakers
└── Castbridge plugin → Sony HT-A9 Chromecast (Living Room)

Control
└── Home Assistant Squeezebox integration → media_player entities
    └── Kitchen tablet (Surface Go 2, 192.168.1.178) → HA dashboard

Device	Role	IP	VLAN
LMS container on Lotus	Music server	192.168.1.83 (br0, its own LAN IP)	Main LAN
Kitchen Pi (CM4)	Squeezelite player	192.168.20.254	IoT VLAN 20
Sony HT-A9	Chromecast endpoint	192.168.20.21	IoT VLAN 20
Surface Go 2	Kitchen control tablet	192.168.1.178	Main LAN

Kitchen Pi¶

Raspberry Pi CM4 in a Waveshare carrier board
OS: Debian 12 (Bookworm) with the official Raspberry Pi kernel (rpt-rpi-v8) — not Raspberry Pi OS, but with full Pi firmware support including config.txt and dtoverlay
Audio HAT: HiFiBerry Pi Zero MiniAMP (PCM5102A DAC + TPA3118 amp)
Network: USB WiFi dongle, locked to the Living Room AP, IoT VLAN 20

Sony HT-A9¶

No wired audio input is available — HDMI is occupied, and there is no optical or analogue input. Chromecast built-in is the only viable endpoint protocol. Sample-accurate sync with the kitchen is therefore not achievable, which is accepted: the rooms are separate and are not heard from the same position.

Configuration¶

LMS container (Lotus)¶


Network type	`br0` with static IP 192.168.1.83
Port	9000 (no port mappings needed on br0)
Appdata	`/mnt/cache/appdata/lyrion`
Music path	`data/media/music`

br0 is required, not a preference — bridge/NAT mode breaks mDNS, so Castbridge cannot discover Chromecast devices. It also avoids the port 9000 clash with Mealie.

Castbridge plugin¶

Not available through the LMS plugin manager — the SourceForge plugin repo URL changed. Install manually, then restart the container:

cd /mnt/cache/appdata/lyrion/cache/Plugins
curl -L https://github.com/philippe44/LMS-Cast/releases/download/2.2.8/CastBridge-2.2.8.zip -o CastBridge.zip
unzip CastBridge.zip && rm CastBridge.zip

In LMS → Manage Plugins → Chromecast bridge:

Network binding: tick Use LMS interface
Port starts from: 35000
LMS Server: 192.168.1.83

The fixed port matters. Castbridge runs its own HTTP server, separate from LMS, to serve audio to Chromecast devices. Left to itself it picks a random high port which the IoT → main LAN firewall blocks, so the Sony connects but plays nothing.

Kitchen Pi — audio overlay¶

/boot/firmware/config.txt:

dtparam=audio=off          # disable onboard BCM2835 audio
dtoverlay=hifiberry-dac    # MiniAMP is a PCM5102A = hifiberry-dac
                           # NOT hifiberry-dacplus (that is for the PCM5122)

Kitchen Pi — Squeezelite¶

sudo apt install -y squeezelite

The Debian init script silently ignores SL_OPTIONS in /etc/default/squeezelite and cannot pass the -s server flag, so use a native unit instead.

/etc/systemd/system/squeezelite.service:

[Unit]
Description=Squeezelite - Lightweight headless Squeezebox emulator
After=network.target sound.target

[Service]
Type=simple
ExecStart=/usr/bin/squeezelite -n Kitchen -o sysdefault:CARD=sndrpihifiberry -s 192.168.1.83 -V ""
Restart=on-failure
RestartSec=5

[Install]
WantedBy=multi-user.target

sudo systemctl daemon-reload
sudo systemctl enable --now squeezelite

-V "" is required: the PCM5102A has no hardware ALSA mixer, and without the flag Squeezelite probes for one, causing instability and volume-control failures.

Kitchen Pi — WiFi power management¶

Disabled to prevent dropouts. /etc/NetworkManager/conf.d/wifi-powersave.conf:

[connection]
wifi.powersave = 2

sudo systemctl restart NetworkManager

Network¶

UniFi firewall rules¶

Direction	Source	Destination	Ports	Purpose
IoT → Main LAN	IoT VLAN 20	192.168.1.83	TCP 9000, 3483, 35000	Squeezelite + Castbridge audio stream
Main LAN → IoT	192.168.1.83	192.168.20.21	TCP 8009	Castbridge → Chromecast control
Main LAN → IoT	Any	192.168.20.254	TCP 22	SSH to the Pi

Organised in UniFi as a port group LMS Ports (9000, 3483, 35000) and a device group LMS Server (192.168.1.83).

Source port on these rules must be Any — see the lessons below.

mDNS¶

UniFi mDNS is set to Auto, which handles Chromecast discovery across VLANs.

Home Assistant¶

Settings → Devices & Services → Add Integration → Squeezebox, server 192.168.1.83, port 9000. This creates media_player.kitchen and media_player.ht_a9 (names may vary).

The kitchen tablet dashboard uses mini-media-player (HACS) per player:

type: custom:mini-media-player
entity: media_player.kitchen
name: Kitchen
artwork: cover

HA's group controls are the better interface for multiroom — LMS's own Stop command stops only the targeted player in a sync group, not the whole group.

Playback Flows¶

Music (multiroom): HA dashboard or LMS web UI → LMS → Squeezelite (Kitchen) + Castbridge → HT-A9 Chromecast (Living Room).

Podcasts and audiobooks: cast from the Audiobookshelf app to the Sony. Reaching the kitchen speakers this way needs a Chromecast receiver running on the Pi — go2rtc is the candidate, and this is not yet implemented.

Data¶

The music library is the existing Plex library on Lotus at data/media/music — LMS reads it through the Plex plugin and stores no separate copy. LMS's own state lives in /mnt/cache/appdata/lyrion and is covered by the appdata backup.

The Kitchen Pi's configuration is not backed up — it is the two files documented above plus a package install, and is quicker to recreate than to restore.